Heavy Metal Hamsters
by TheSecretCity
Summary: My response to ilovetvalot's Fanfic Challenge, pairing Prentiis/Elle. Set during Elle's leave after "The Fisher King".
1. Facedump

Author's Note: Did you know there are only THREE Elle/Emily stories on the entire ? Anyway, I'm dedicating this the who was the one who wanted more of these two together on the Fanfic Challenge, and I was the one who got that pairing. Hope you like it! Oh, and the title will be explained later. There is a point to it besides my rampart strangeness(wanders off humming under breath like a lunatic).

Facedump

Agent Emily Prentiss never seemed to get good dates. Invariably, something was wrong with the men, or she said something absolutely geeky to drive them off. Or she was trying to say something geeky to drive them off because they were boring her to death.

This date was the option behind door number three. They were in a bar, and she was listening to a long, involved monologue about this guy's family. Specifically his father. She had tried to interject her most geeky comments-like knowing every episode of the original _Star Trek_ and a fascination with Chekov (To throw him off. Didn't help). Now she was looking for an escape route-another guy, a girl, a long-lost friend, a call from the office. The last was the least likely, as she rode a desk in Counter-Terrorism translating Arabic ezines looking for evidence of terrorist groups.

Her eyes unfocussed and wandered the bar up and down. Something, anything to get her out of this date with this word-spewing being.

There was a woman at the bar itself, in jeans and a slinky top. She had crinkled brown hair, was lean, and was swinging back tequila with enviable ease. And her nails were sculpted red.

Even a reject from someone like her would be enough to get Emily out of her current situation.

"Tom," she interrupted. "I think I just saw a friend of mine. Give me a sec, will you?"

She didn't wait for a reply, but went over to the woman. She was greeted with a sly grin and soft voice. "Bad date?"

"Is it that obvious?"

The woman's grin grew wide, and her voice matched it so that her date could hear. "I haven't seen you in forever! Sit down, girl. How have you been?"

"I've been really good," she agreed, plopping down gratefully. "How about you?"

Out the corner of her eye, her date got up in disgust and left in a huff. She couldn't help but giggle.

"Thank you. I'm Emily Prentiss."

The woman shook her hand. "Elle Greenaway. What's your poison?"

"This early, White Russians."

Elle signaled the bartender. "That must have been bad, to approach a complete stranger. White Russian for my friend, please."

"I seem to attract bad dates."

"I know what you mean. Especially if you have a career."

"My God, yes. The higher on the ladder, the more men seem to think you need a good lay, and since they _are_ God's gift to women, well!"

"Exactly," Elle took another sip of tequila and stirred the lime with her finger.

Emily's drink appeared. "What do you do, Elle?"

"I'm FBI."

"Me, too. Counter-Terrorism."

"Behavioral Analysis. Sort of."

"Explain that one."

"I'm on medical leave. I got shot."

"Ouch." and now she was saying dumb things.

Elle shrugged. "I'm basically fine. The doctors are just being overcautious and racking up their fees. Insurance always pays up, you know?'

"I know! I got beat up on an undercover in Texas, with a guy agent. They had him back on duty in a month but didn't let me back for two. He was the one with broken bones, but no, little agent Prentiss wasn't even allowed to ride a desk."

"Did you complain?"

"Why do you think I'm translating Arabic at a desk in Quantico instead of being out in the field?"

"Men," Elle agreed.

"It didn't help that my superior on that case had wandering lizard hands, either."

"Ew."

"Exactly."

"Listen, how about we get out of here before we're totally soused, catch a flick, whatever?"

Emily wasn't sure if that was a date, a friendly invitation, or both.

"Why not?" Sure beat getting drunk, though.


	2. Heavy Metal Hamsters

Heavy Metal Hamsters

The movie was playing when Elle leaned over and whispered.

"Which one of us picked this?"

"Neither. It was the only thing playing."

"It's boring."

"Very."

Elle fished out her cell phone. They were in the back, far from other patrons. "Look at this."

Emily leaned over. The picture appeared to be rodents done up like ZZ Top. "What is that?"

"A joke I got, that doesn't make sense to me. Heavy Metal Hamsters. It's a photo story going round the Net, about this Alvin and the Chipmunks thing, except it's for adults. Sex, drugs, rock and roll."

"And hamsters." "And hamsters. Which is creepy."

"I had a gerbil when I was a kid. Now he'll be burned into my brain wearing a leather jacket and a cigarette in his mouth."

"It's supposed to be funny."

"People have twisted humor."

"Very. Shall we leave?"

"Where to?"

Elle was very close to Emily. So close that it didn't seem unnatural when their lips brushed ever so lightly. And then Elle pulled back, waiting for the reaction.

Emily licked her lips. It had been a good first-date kiss, really. Passionate and delicate. Most men never had the subtly to grasp those basics.

Emily licked her lips again. "Want to come over to my place for a nightcap?"

Elle smiled. "Sure, Emily. Let's do that."

Author's Note: Review?


	3. Cereal Dust

**Cereal Dust**

**Emily woke up the next morning with a bad case of cottonmouth, the sunlight in her bedroom window blinding her eyes, and hearing Elle cussing as she clattered around the kitchen.**

**It had been a nice night, full of soft touches she hadn't had in a good span of years, sensitivity that only came once in awhile. And the cause of that, pushy woman, was ransacking her kitchen.**

**She pulled on a shirt and some panties and went to join her.**

**Elle had commandeered her bathrobe, which fluffed around her in a rather comical fashion. **

"**Cereal dust, nothing but goddamn cereal dust in all the boxes."**

**Emily ran a hand through her hair. "I've got an emergency stash of Rice Krispies behind the canned beans. **

**Elle didn't answer but went to the pantry and retrieved the cereal.**

**Emily got out the bowls and spoons and milk. Elle served them both.**

**When they had started, Elle finally spoke directly to her. "You didn't ask about it."**

**It. Elle's scar that ran around her left breast, above her heart.**

"**If you wanted me to know, you'd tell me."**

**Elle nodded. "I was shot. In my home. By a kidnapper we were chasing, a psycho who believed he was someone from King Arthur's Court."**

"**I'm sorry."**

**Elle shook her head. "That's not it. Not even the enforced leave."**

"**Then what?"**

**Elle played with her cereal. "I was sleeping with my boss. Jason. He never said he was sorry for what happened, how I'd become the bait. Even though I know we wouldn't have caught him otherwise, to be so, I don't know…."**

"**Remorseless," Emily supplied. Elle nodded.**

"**He spent so much time even taking care of me. I just shut him out. I couldn't stand it anymore. He cares, but he doesn't. Does that make sense?"**

"**In a way," Emily agreed.**

"**Not that you were a self-pity fuck," and Elle flashed her a grin that would light up a dark room. "I came here because I like you, Emily. I connected with you."**

"**Was it like when you connected with Jason?"**

**It was an honest question, not intended to needle. And Elle didn't act as if was hurtful. "I knew Jason found me attractive. He wasn't unpleasant, had a nice face, good manners, hell of a cook, a great teacher. I felt safe with him. And now I don't. I can't."**

**Emily reached over and took Elle's hand in hers. "Maybe what he did was right professionally but wrong personally."**

"**It was. I told him that I couldn't be around him anymore, to give me space to decide if we were a we or a him and me or not an us ever again and don't call I'll call you when I figure it out. That was cold."**

"**That was true," Emily argued for her. "You can't have a relationship with someone and have that kind of distrust there."**

**Elle nodded, then laughed. "God, I'm an idiot, talking about my last relationship like this. Cosmo says that's a no-no."**

"**You read Cosmo?" Emily asked.**

"**Sometimes."**

"**Me too."**

**They sized each other up.**

"**Every damn issue!" they both announced at the same time.**

**Even though it wasn't as romantic as ice cream or oysters or chocolate, Emily and Elle feed each other Rice Krispies.**

**Author's Note: I've always believed Elle and Gideon had something going on. Especially after he was talking to himself/her in 'The Aftermath' and calling her Baby. You don't just do that. Unless you're Garcia, of course. ****J**


	4. Rabbit

Rabbit

When Elle had left, she also left her cell number. "I'm not at my apartment much anymore. I need a new place to crash."

"Crash here," Emily offered impulsively.

"I don't know how long it'll be before I find a new place," Elle warned.

"That's okay," and it was. Elle was the most alive person she'd ever met, and having her living there wouldn't bother her.

"You always offer your apartment after a first date?"

"No. I usually offer a restraining order if they ever visit again."

Elle said she'd be back that evening with the things she would need.

All day at work Emily only half read her assigned articles. There were some words she translated with less then usual accuracy. When she came home she began to make dinner-pasta, marinara sauce, steamed vegetables. Elle arrived after six, when Emily had the food out on the table.

"Wow," Elle left her suitcases in the foyer and followed her nose to the eat-in kitchen.

Emily smiled in a way she hadn't since her last bout with weed.

They sat down, and Elle complimented the heady sauce. "Where's you learn to cook?"

"Rome," she said. "Mother always made me learn something local wherever she was posted. In Italy it was cooking. In Riyadh it was calligraphy, and that was hard because I had to get fluent in Arabic quick. And she couldn't think of anything the year we were in Bangkok, so I learned how to pick locks, pockets, and be a con artist. And spear fishing. I'm babbling, aren't I?"

Elle reached over and tucked some of Emily's hair behind her ear. "What did your mother do?"

"American ambassador. She still is."

"Keep babbling," there was a bottle of red wine. Elle wrestled with the cork until it popped off, and poured two glasses.

"She wanted me to be a translator, like with the state department. Thanks."

Elle had handed her a glass. "Do you like doing that?"

"Well, I'm good. But I got my degree in criminal psychology, which nearly made Mother have a heart attack. She settled for a bout of hives, though."

"Good for Ambassador Prentiss."

"Hives are good?"

"Shows more creativity."

"What about you?"

"My dad was a cop. Mom worked in a Laundromat. Still does. I never told her I was shot, asked Jason not to. He respected that. She would've gone nuts. Daddy died in the line of duty, and she wouldn't want me to do that."

"Were you ever a cop?"

"I went straight to Quantico. Overachievement syndrome, I guess. But after the mean streets of Brooklyn, it didn't seem all that terrifying."

"No male dominated field is scary for the daughters of single mothers."

"Amen to that."

They ate companionably, and Emily finally asked if Elle had gone to the doctor today?

Elle grimaced. "He's a man. I try to avoid him."

"Maybe I could come next time, take some of the heat?"

Elle leaned forward until their noses were almost touching over the table. "Maybe I should. You've obviously had a serious, untreated head injury that needs tended to."

Emily laughed and let in drop. She could read the signs.

She was a profiler, after all.

Author's Note: It just made sense that Emily was raised by a single mom. We never hear about Mr. Prentiss, after all, just Ambassador. And I meant no insult to to any who work in places which provide public laundering of clothing. It just fell in my head and took up residence where my brain once resided.


	5. Unshop

_**Unshop**_

_**Life with Elle had become comfortable, in a sense. They left at the same time every day, Emily to work and Elle to whatever chore she had, or doctor's appointment. They would met back at Emily's later, though usually by then Elle had had her fill of soap operas out of sheer boredom.**_

"_**I'm bored," Ell informed her two weeks later. "Let's go shopping."**_

_**Emily blinked back surprise. Elle had told of a hatred for any kind of purchasing trip, mainly because they only places her mother could afford were consignment stores and Wal-Mart. **_

"_**Okay," Emily agreed.**_

_**Laughing, Elle added, "And we'll unshop**_** too."**

"**Huh?" Not very ladylike a response.**

"**You've never unshopped?"**

"**Sweetie, I've never even **_**heard**_** of it."**

**Elle snuggled into the couch where they were sitting. "You go to a high-end store. It can be food, clothes, power tools. Whatever. You shop and act all serious about it. Then you decide you don't want the stuff-and points if you have an employee help you find it in the first place-and unshop it all."**

"**Put it back?" Emily guessed.**

"**It's extra-fun at jewelry stores and perfume shops where they have to get it all out for you."**

**Emily cracked up. "Elle, that is nothing short of the pure genius of supreme evil."**

"**To the mall?"**

"**To the mall."**

**. . . . . . . . . . .**

**They hit Macy's, a boutique, and a makeup store before Elle reached out and snagged Emily's arm, a grin of pure delight on her face. "There."**

**Emily followed her extended finger. A jeweler's. And grinned back.**

**They stopped at the gold chains first.**

"**That would look awesome on you, corazon," Elle told her. They agreed to let their couple status out to throw everyone off even more.**

**Instantly they had a salesgirl. "Would you like to look at something?"**

**Elle nodded and tapped the glass.**

**An hour later they had a sizable pile of jewelry. And it was hardest to unshop, because there was some good stuff in there.**

"**We can't take all of it," Emily reminded her. Elle nodded.**

"**But we could buy some. We've been good," and Elle's wolfish grin reminded Emily they had different definitions of the word 'good'.**

"**This for you," Elle picked up the initial necklace she had spotted, a filigree chain, and a charm. It was a rose, and both were gold.**

**Emily's hand went into the pile and came up with something that seemed to be pure Elle: a diamond bracelet with a letter E worked into it.**

**Elle nodded. **

**. . . . . . . . . . . **

**Back at Emily's apartment, they uncorked a bottle of wine her mother had sent and admired their new presents to themselves. And Elle kneaded out the kinks that were in Emily's neck from bending over a computer screen for eight hours.**


	6. Knitmare

Knitmare

Emily didn't often take up new hobbies. From her youth she had found drinking, bar-hopping, cards, and games of luck to be the highest form of entertainment. Crafts, art, and exercise beyond what she needed to stay in regulation shape were an abomination.

Elle had slowly changed that. Instead of her weekly gym date, she went jogging with Elle twice a week. Together they had repainted her den in warm honey tones, getting a good part of it on each other. And now, coming home from work, she found her girlfriend in the middle of several balls of yarn, swearing in her atypical fashion.

"Goddam, ugly, frigging, bastard, jackass," was the running commentary. Emily plopped down on the floor beside her.

"What are you making?"

"Nothing. Son of a bitch in a beech tree."

"What are you going to make?" she amended. The yarn was tangled six ways around the needles. Emily reached over and began untangling.

"A scarf," Elle let her have the source of her frustration. "With six colors."

"Wouldn't it be easier to just use one or two colors?"

"Yes."

"I see. There, all free."

The separate threads cluttered the floor as Emily revealed the needles. Elle smiled.

"Thanks, beautiful."

"Anytime. Now, if you're finished with your knitmare, I have a surprise for you."

Elle leaned forward, waiting, the light gathering at her neck.

"This," she had heard Elle talking about a band she'd heard as a kid in Brooklyn, a group she'd never been able to identify. Emily, with her vast connections, had tracked down their one album.

Elle took it lovingly. "You-wow, Em. Just wow."

"What are girlfriends for?"

They played it as they went to bed that night, deep dark beats and heavenly guitar.

Author's Note: I never knit. Otherwise, it all looks like a huge knitmare.


	7. Drizzmal

Drizzmal

One day when she came home, Elle was gone. She had left a note on the kitchen table.

_Em, sweetie,_

_I'm headed back to the BAU to see if I can still do this job. I'll be incommunicado for awhile. Jason called, too. I'm not sure if we are a we, yet (him and I) or what, but I need to see him to find out._

_Just chuck my stuff someplace if it's in the way. _

_Love on toast, Elle_

It was dark outside, drizzling under steely clouds. Emily tucked the letter into thirds to save it. It smelled like Elle's perfume, a woodsy concoction Emily had bought for her.

In the bedroom, Emily noticed only a few things gone-the perfume, the diamond bracelet, some of Elle's clothes. Enough for a go bag. And the CD she had tracked down was absent, too.

She picked up the clothes Elle had left on the floor. Would she tell Jason about Emily? Probably, if they were a couple. In a way they still were, Emily was just the break Elle had needed from a guilt-ridden man dually infatuated with her and his work. Perhaps she had a clearer head now.

The sights of the Capital were visible from the bedroom window. They had never made love with the shades closed, letting the lights of the Senate play over their bodies. Now Elle would go back to Jason, to the apartment with the birds on the wall, and the train sets kept lovingly by a man whose son hardly ever spoke to him.

Was she bitter? She refolded a shirt, realizing it could be hers or Elle's. Maybe she was. Only the worst men seemed to find her, and she thought she had found one good woman. But maybe she wasn't good enough for Elle. Maybe…

Elle's voice was clear in her head. "Em, don't be an eejit. What has 'maybe' ever done but drive people insane? Literally?"

Later, she would hear about how Elle had yelled at her boss. How she started to drink. How she shot a man, circumstances unclear, and left the BAU. She would hear all of this from Jason, Elle's Jason, after he had come to accept that she was a good agent. She would learn that Elle had recommended her to Erin Strauss before going on her bender as a good replacement. But it would be years before she heard from Elle Greenaway again.


	8. Actionaire

Actonaire

It was the middle of 2010 when Elle breezed through like a cloudburst in July, with a single phone call in the aftermath of Haley's death.

"Prentiss," she answered her cell.

"Wow," Elle's voice wove through like smoke. "You never changed your number."

"Hey! How are you?'

"I'm okay. I heard about Mrs. Hotchner through the grapevine."

It took a second for Emily to connect 'Mrs. Hotchner' to 'Haley'. "Yeah. Hotch is a mess."

"And Jack's okay?"

"As well as he can be. Hotch beat Foyet to death," Emily found herself saying.

"Good. He was a right goddam bastard."

"How'd you hear?"

"I do freelance detective work now, so I keep in touch with some people."

"Are you back in New York City?"

"Yeah. And Jason's here, too, in Westchester."

"You guys figured yourselves out, then?"

She was still a little angry with Gideon for abandoning Reid like he had.

"We did," Elle confirmed. "Mom's overjoyed. She keeps wanting to plan the wedding."

"I'm so sorry."

"Yeah, you know all about pain-in-the-ass mothers. I hear you're quite the action hero at the BAU."

"Not true. I almost quit."

"In future, don't let Strauss get to you. She's a power-mad bureaucrat in the finest tradition of governmental lunacy."

"I haven't and I won't ever again, believe me."

"But," Elle added with the sneaky tone preceding a delighted attack on someone. "If you ever need another job, look up Greenaway Investigations."

"Smartass. How's the knitting?" "Low, Em. Really low, honey."

"I make an effort."

"Any good dates?"

"Still the same losers."

"Go find someone who isn't. Hell. Ask Garcia to set you up. She knows how to pick 'em like a champ. Okay?"

"Okay."

"Bye-bye, beautiful."

Elle hung up before Emily. Maybe she'd ask Garcia if she knew a nice girl looking for a date.

Author's Note: And done! Just under the wire, too. I wanted to resolve the 'Whatever happened to them after they left the BAU?' question. How'd I do?


End file.
